Den 2024-05-20 kl. 10:56 skrev Tony Duell via cctalk:
On Sun, May 19, 2024 at 4:56 PM Tarek Hoteit via cctalk
<cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:
Thank you, Josh. How did your passion start with classical computers? Maybe
this helps in understanding the generation?
I know how I got started, but not really why. Although I can explain
how it progressed.
It was May 1986, I was at a sale of old electronics hoping to get a
keyboard for my homebrew computer (this was before cheap PC keyboards
in the UK). I saw a Philips P850 minicomputer being sold essentially
for the scrap metal price. It had the user and service manuals with
it, and it had a lights-and-switches front panel which I'd read about
and never used. I bought it and somehow got it back to my student
room.
That evening I realised that there was a period of about 25 years of
computing which was going to be lost and forgotten if nobody did
something about it. So I did something and started collecting and
restoring all the old computers I could find. It was a lot easier to
find minicomputers and the like back then than it is now.
But why did I buy that initial P850? I am not sure. I've always been
interested in the history of electronics and computers, so perhaps
that was it.
-tony
I used to work on the P6000 series, and they had a very interesting
architecture. For those who want to know a bit more about Philips'
history, I can recommend an e-book written by one of the guys in Sweden,
where the P6000 series was developped. The P6000 was based on the P800,
but extended into a system appropiate for bookings, airline
reservations, banking etc.
(Link below).
The author is Mats Danielson. By the way, the James Bond film "For your
eyes only" shows a lot of Philips hardware. The "atomic comb" is a PTS
6272 keyboard with (I think) a display boltet to the back of it.
Hilarious, just like the book.
/Nico
---------------------------
Read my new history book (free e-book)
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/377777427_The_Rise_and_Fall_of_Philips_Data_Systems
/Nico
